AN: Agarfinkel, that one's for you ;-)

The smell's uprising

- Two month after the Fodra-incident -

Hubert Oswell didn't know what had hit his nose when he opened the door to Pascal's room in the Amarcian enclave this evening. Judging by the way it made his toenails curl, its equivalent in mass had to be at least something of the size of a small freight train. It took every ounce of his willpower to control his face and stomach against the sensory overload that was trying to tear his brain apart.

"Pascal, what on Ephinea are you doing!?" called out the lieutenant to the woman he couldn't see, a hand over his mouth and nose in a useless attempt to protect them both from the smell. He waited a few seconds for a reply, but received no answer. His mouth opened to try again but then stopped. The lieutenant wasn't even sure if sonic waves could travel through thick air like this, so why waste breath?

Instead he walked over the piles of things that had accumulated in her room since he had last seen her and began searching for the woman. It didn't take long for him to find her. She was laying on the ground snoring, her head beside one of the technical devices she had built a few weeks ago. If Hubert remembered correctly she had named it 'Laptop' or something like that. The soldier raised an eyebrow when he noticed that she was barely clothed, wearing her underwear while only partly covered by a blanket. Had he seen this sight a month earlier, he would be crimson red and beginning to stutter by now. But the month had been a long one and many crazy things had happened. One of them was the official declaration that the lieutenant and Pascal were in love.

He sighed when he remembered how he had arrived here four weeks earlier, carrying two bags full with bananas and cherries and an unbreakable determination to finally show the Amarcian how he felt. The memory of what had happened after that... that was still something for him to blush about.

"Pascal, have you been working all night again?" a disapproving glance wandered over his eyes, but hidden behind it was the love that he felt for her. And a little bit of less appropriate thoughts as he again noticed how much skin she was showing.

"Hwmm..mhh...hwa?" the pile of meat on the floor that was Pascal had started moving and slowly stood up. Dizzy from her sudden return to the waking world she rubbed her eyes. As the world around her became more clear and detailed she finally noticed that she had company.

Her eyes flew wide open.

"Hu! I didn't know you were coming! Cuddles!" she tried to embrace her lover tightly but he fended her off by holding her shoulders as far away from him as possible.

"Not before you have taken a bath Pascal. A pile of dump smells flattering compared to you," he said with closed eyes.

He had learned not to look at her when she needed to take a bath. If he did he would give her the chance to convince him to just ignore the smell by her sheer adorableness.

The Amarcian answered in the tone of a little child.

"No fun! And I can't smell that bad, I just had a bath three...no maybe four days ago! Or five! Give me cuddles!"

"No Pascal, the smell is terrifying! No cuddles before the bath. Go now or I'll make you"

Seeing that the 'adorably-cute'-method didn't have the desired effect, Pascal changed tactics.

"That doesn't sound bad at all. Why don't you help me with the bath, Huuuuu?" she drew out his name in a suggestive way he didn't knew she was capable off. But as enchanting as her flirting sounded, he knew better by now than to listen to her.

"We both know that you won't even get near the bath if I 'help' you. Now go, I'll be here for you as long as you want after that."

The promise of as many caresses and as much cuddling as she wanted made the idea of a bath that much better. She was gone and filling the bathtub before he could even blink. With a sigh but also a small smile he took the cup of liquid chocolate that stood besides the 'Laptop' and poured the rest of it down the sink. Then he started cleaning the rest of the room. It wasn't that much work compared to the times he had done it before. Then again, the last time he had cleaned up her room was only a week in the past.

Hearing her finally sink into the bathtub while he was cleaning made him relax a bit. She wouldn't try to avoid the bath anymore. This time.

After the last pile of trash had vanished he dared to let another smile show on his lips in anticipation of what would happen in the near future. But before that, he would have to wait for the second participant of the events to finish her bath. With an exaggerated sigh the lieutenant took one of the magazines he had previously carefully sorted on her desk and sat in the only armchair his lover had ever owned. It was a gift from the lieutenant to the Amarcian, chosen in wise anticipation that he would put it to good use in the many times he would have to clean her room.

The blue armchair was very broad, maybe even too broad for one single person. It was comfortable enough to sleep in and the colored wyrm-leather had many other properties that made the chair just that much more enchanting. For example: Its temperature could be regulated via Eleth infusion or extraction in small amounts, a task the Amarcian and her lover could do in their sleep by now.

As the lieutenant sat in the armchair, barely reading the texts in the magazines he was looking at, he felt his eyes grow heavy. Hubert had to admit, the travel to the enclave could be tiring at times, though he knew that it was always worth it. But combining this with the new, tiring extra-work the president had put him through and an armchair this comfortable made it hard to stay awake.

It only took him a few minutes until he lost the fight against his own fatigue and fell into the depth of dreamland.

The warmth and heaviness of another body awakened the lieutenant who was still dressed in his uniform. Sitting in his lap, her arms around his neck and her chin on his shoulder in the big armchair was Pascal in what had to be a fresh set of clothes. He wasn't entirely sure since both of them were covered by a blanket. The apple-like smell of her freshly washed hair filled his nose as he drew in her enchanting scent. She apparently had fallen asleep again after she had decided that Hubert would be a fitting mattress for her. He wondered for a short moment why he hadn't awakened while she had made herself comfortable on him. But considering how well Pascal was able to sneak up on him if she wanted to, it didn't surprise him all that much.

A small pause in Pascal's breathing pattern that suddenly continued as if nothing had happened told him that she was awake as well, but wasn't showing it. She was waiting for him to act, to surprise her.

Well, she had taken a bath and her being close felt especially cozy when he woke up, so he gave her the reward. Gently he started to caress her back and continued by lightly tickling her neck. He could feel the hair on her neck stand up way before she started to snicker. Dreamy eyes looked at him when he turned his head to meet them. He gave her a tender wake-up kiss on the lips.

"Good morning, sleepyhead," she whispered to him, her voice pregnant with affection. Hearing her say that made his heart skip a beat for a second.

"Good morning to you too, sleepycat," he whispered back.

She gave him a small smile of pity for this play of words before she kissed him again. For a while both of them were content with just sitting there, basking in the warmth of each other, exchanging gentle caresses and kisses. It was the Amarcian who first broke the silence between them.

"I was writing down an idea I had on the Laptop I showed you. That's why I was up all night and still all sleepy and stuff when you came here."

The lieutenant looked at her in confusion.

"Huh? Pascal where is that coming from?"

"You were asking me what I was doing earlier, dummy. I just told you. You know, I had this awesome idea of..." before she could continue Hubert had put a finger on her lips.

"Why don't you tell me what you were doing after that?"

The lieutenant wiggled with his eyebrows in what should have been a suggestive manner. But on him it just looked plain ridiculous and the Amarcian had no inhibitions in showing him that by starting to giggle uncontrollably.

"That?" she asked when she was able to talk again, trying to wiggle her eyebrows the same way Hubert had done.

This, in turn, made her giggle again.

"That!" Hubert confirmed, undeterred by her amusement of his facial expression.

"Will it contain more cuddles?" she asked in between two snickers, attempting to sound as serious as possible in her situation.

"As many as you want" answered the lieutenant just as serious.

"I guess in that case, I shall bear with that," she answered his previous question.

Without further warning the lieutenant stood up, his lover in his arms and let the blanket that had covered both of them fall on the floor.

"You will drown in cuddles, I tell you!" the lieutenant gave her an exaggerated warning look.

"Oh, we'll see" answered the woman with a provocative tone as she kissed him on the cheek.

There was no place she would rather be than in his arms at this moment. And they had all the time in the world to do what they wanted.

The night was still young.

AN:
I...I think this was too much fluff ._. But...oh come on, just imagine the scenes I wrote! This is just so much fluff that I simply go 'Arglbagarglbagargl'.

The original plan was to write how Pascal overdid it with working on writing too much on her Laptop and then simply commenting in the AN: "Me while writing 'The dragon's uprising' (DU) ". But the fluff was strong in this one and so it simply took over the fic. Evil fluff, you ruined my idea!

Anyway, some Pascal-Hubert relationship-expansion while I'm writing more for DU.